DON CARLOS

Aviana Angélique Adell as Elisabeth de Valois, Queen of France (lead) in Shakespeare’s Don Carlos. The movie of this classic Shakespeare drama premieres in April 2012 in Munich. Schiller called his Don Carlos, “A family portrait in a princely house”. It took him four years to write it and he kept revising for eighteen years. In the end, he was unable to separate the domestic and political lives of the characters. As he wrote: “It was my intention to expose the shameful horrors of the Inquisition, and to revenge prostituted humanity….I wished to seize the poignard with which tragedy had hitherto only superficially touched men and thrust it home”. Don Carlos is twice the length of an ordinary play and on a much grander scale than Schiller’s earlier works. The Version of the German movie-drama of 2012 was cut to fit in a 90 minute movie session. Don Carlos was written in blank verse in imitation of Shakespeare. Schiller’s sources included Don Carlos, Nouvelle historique by Cesar Vischard Saint-Real (1672) in which both Carlos and Don Juan develop a passion for Elizabeth.In the very complex plot, there is a plethora of letters, secret messages, keys and misunderstandings. When Carlos’s letters to Elisabeth are found, Philip accuses her of harlotry, and she threatens to flee to France with their daughter. more…